Being Personally Moral Is Not Enough, Atheists Need A Coherent Metaethics

Atheists can be as moral as anyone else. When theists imply that atheism by itself entails that people will either likely or necessarily be less moral, they trade in oblivious, self-satisfied, prejudicial thinking which besmirches atheists unfairly.

But it is not mere prejudice for theists to demand atheists give an account of their metaethical positions. By this I mean that it is totally justifiable for theists to ask atheists to explain to them what morality is, where it comes from, and why anyone must obey its dictates. All of us, as rational, morally engaged human beings, whether theist or atheist should take these philosophical questions seriously and develop thoughtful responses to them. It is no more prejudicial or insulting to ask an atheist for a consistent, defensible, and persuasive account of her beliefs about morality than it is to ask a theist for a consistent, defensible, and persuasive account of his beliefs about God.

And just as many an atheist argues that theists should abandon their belief in God because it contradicts so much of what they must acknowledge is true from science, metaphysics, logic, epistemology, morality, etc., so similarly, if a given atheist’s views on morality or her moral practices are undermined by her views about science, metaphysics, logic, epistemology, and even some of her own moral intuitions, then it is appropriate for the theist to accuse the atheist of an inconsistency and even suggest that the atheist abandon the inconsistent moral views or practices. It is even fine for the theist to suggest that his God hypothesis solves philosophical problems that atheists are stuck with. If God were necessary for a coherent conception of morality, then atheists would indeed be faced with a tough choice: either posit the God hypothesis to make sense of morality or admit that their moral views are incoherent and lack any force of truth.

If atheists’ moral views cannot be grounded in truths, then their (or anyone’s) imposition of norms has no special authority that anyone is morally obliged to heed. Moral claims would be just posits of convention that anyone might respect or not with no moral responsibility in truth.

The same, of course, goes for theists. If they cannot coherently ground their claims about God-given morality in a satisfactory explanation of where God’s moral law derives its objectively binding character, then even despite their belief in God which is oft assumed to give them an upper hand in these debates, they too are stuck without true moral standing when imposing their norms.

My own views on ethics are deeply influenced by a comparable mixture of Aristotelian perfectionism and deontological qualifications as the Roman Catholic Church’s are. The primary differences between my views and there primarily come from my strong incorporation of Nietzschean and evolutionary insights on the one hand and their overly strong commitment to Aristotelian metaphysics and to unjustified theological commitments. But when they reason about ethics as the great St. Thomas Aquinas, the official philosopher of the Roman Catholic Church, did they are working, at least in foundations from grounds which were so secularly accessible that they were originally non-Christian and Aristotelian. And I like to imagine that Aquinas was a forward thinking, innovative kind of philosopher whose thought if he lived today would be far closer to mine than to that of those who want to freeze ethical thinking with his own, thirteenth century, perspectives.

In short, just as being a good moral person does not by itself make one’s God true or belief in God a justified belief, so being a good moral person does not make either the theist or the atheist’s beliefs about morality intellectually justified or their moral practices truly good. Atheists and theists alike must come up with metaethical accounts that explain what makes norms binding in a moral way upon others.

It is a total cop out when atheists evade this serious philosophical problem when every time it is posed to them they interpret it as a bigoted accusation atheists are bad people. The psychological fact that moral inclinations are present in atheist hearts and deeds, proves nothing, by itself about whether our views are coherent.

Dr. Daniel Fincke has his PhD in philosophy from Fordham University and spent 11 years teaching in college classrooms. He wrote his dissertation on Ethics and the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. On Camels With Hammers, the careful philosophy blog he writes for a popular audience, Dan argues for atheism and develops a humanistic ethical theory he calls “Empowerment Ethics”. Dan also teaches affordable, non-matriculated, video-conferencing philosophy classes on ethics, Nietzsche, historical philosophy, and philosophy for atheists that anyone around the world can sign up for. (You can learn more about Dan’s online classes here.) Dan is an APPA (American Philosophical Practitioners Association) certified philosophical counselor who offers philosophical advice services to help people work through the philosophical aspects of their practical problems or to work out their views on philosophical issues. (You can read examples of Dan’s advice here.) Through his blogging, his online teaching, and his philosophical advice services each, Dan specializes in helping people who have recently left a religious tradition work out their constructive answers to questions of ethics, metaphysics, the meaning of life, etc. as part of their process of radical worldview change.